Chicago Cubs vs. St. Louis Cardinals preview, Friday 7/28, 7:15 CT

Today’s roster move: Here

Friday notes...

• FOUR-GAME ST. LOUIS SERIES UPDATE: This is the Cubs’ 13th four-game series at St. Louis since the league was divided into three divisions in 1994. With their win last night, the Cubs are 6-7 in first games of those series. They are 6-6 in second games, including 2-3 after winning the first. They are 21-28 overall, having won only to series, both by 3-1, in 2007 and 2017. They have split five series and lost five, losing all four in 2000 and three of four in 2003, 2013, 2015 and 2021. (Courtesy BCB’s JohnW53)
• RUN DIFFERENTIAL UPDATE: The Cubs’ run differential of +55 is a season high. Their previous high was +52, after a 6-2 win at Minnesota on May 12 — the last time they were at .500, 19-19. They bottomed out at -13 after a 13-3 drubbing at San Francisco on June 11, which made them 28-37. They were just +19 after a 7-5 loss at home to the Nationals on July 17. Since then, while winning seven of eight, they have outscored their opponents by 73-37, an average score of 8-4. (Courtesy BCB’s JohnW53)
• HE’S HOT: Mike Tauchman, last 13 games since July 8: .300/.364/.560 (15-for-50), four doubles, three home runs, five walks, 11 runs scored.
• ALSO HOT: Christopher Morel, three games on the current road trip: .500/.571/.833 (6-for-12), a double, a home run, six runs scored.

Here are today’s particulars.

Cubs lineup:

Cardinals lineup:

Hayden Wesneski, RHP vs. Jordan Montgomery, LHP

Hayden Wesneski was recalled from Triple-A Iowa to start this game. He’s made three outings at Iowa since the beginning of this month to get stretched out to start. The last one, July 22 vs. Indianapolis, was quite good: five innings, 70 pitches, four hits, no runs, no walks, eight strikeouts.

This will be Wesneski’s first career start against the Cardinals. He has made one relief appearance against them, June 25 in London, where he faced four batters and allowed one hit and one walk, with two strikeouts (Nolan Arenado and Jordan Walker).

The Cubs hit Jordan Montgomery pretty hard Sunday at Wrigley Field — seven runs (five earned) in six innings, all of them in the first three innings. It was kind of surprising Oli Marmol let him stay in, maybe their relievers were overworked. Cody Bellinger homered off Montgomery.

That ended a nine-start stretch in which he had a 1.68 ERA. Hopefully, the last outing was the first of a rough stretch for Montgomery.

In general the Cubs have hit lefties pretty well this year. Here’s hoping that continues tonight.

Statcast

Statcast

Today’s game is on Marquee Sports Network. You can find out if Marquee is available via a provider in your area here.

Here is the complete MLB.com Mediacenter for today.

MLB.com Gameday

Baseball-reference.com game preview

Please visit our SB Nation Cardinals site Viva el Birdos. If you do go there to interact with Cardinals fans, please be respectful, abide by their individual site rules and serve as a good representation of Cub fans in general and BCB in particular.

The 2023 Game Thread procedure will be like last year’s, similar to what we’ve used for Spring Training.

You’ll find the game preview posted separately on the front page two hours before game time (90 minutes for some early day games following night games).

At the same time, a StoryStream containing the preview will also post on the front page, titled “Cubs vs. (Team) (Day of week/date) game threads.” It will contain every post related to that particular game, including the First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread, as well as the recap when it’s published. The recap will also live on the front page as a separate post.

You will also be able to find the preview, First Pitch Thread and the overflow thread in the box marked “Chicago Cubs Game Threads” at the bottom of the front page (you can also find them in this section link). The StoryStream for each game can also be found in that section.

The First Pitch thread will post at five minutes before game time, then an overflow thread at 90 minutes after the scheduled game time.

Discuss amongst yourselves.